Searching the Past
by anchorxandxhope
Summary: When the child of Clare Edwards and Eli Goldsworthy tries to dig up something from their high school years. Oneshot  Not the best summary, please R&R.


I find myself in my parents' room, looking for anything of what they were

like when they were my age. Under the bed, there was nothing. Couldn't find

anything in their night stands either. I make my way to my mother's dresser. Her

jewelry lay sprawled across the top, some hung over picture frames. In those

frames captured moments of their happiness. One was from their wedding on the

coast of Ireland. Mom looked beautiful, her dress blowing in the wind, the

sunlight shining bright off of her chin lengthed, auburn hair. Dad looked

handsome, excited that who he was standing next to him would be there for the

rest of his life. Another frame held our first family photo in the hospital room

where I was born. Mom was propped up in bed, holding a little me inside her

arms. Both were looking down at me, cheerfully and in awe as if they had seen

the greatest thing in the world.

I look in the mirror that hung on the wall and study myself carefully. I

had my father's dark brown hair, his clever smirk. I had my mother's pale skin,

her ocean blue eyes. The perfect blend of their genes.

"Keelan! Dinner!" I heard Mom call from downstairs.

"Coming!" I reply. Even dinner couldn't make me budge. Five minutes went by

with me trying to think of places where memorabilia from the past could be. The

closet held their everyday clothes, party attire Mom's wedding dress, Dad's tux,

and boxes duct taped shut. Writing was scrawled across the sides. I sit on my

knees as I try to decipher the hand writing. Dad clearly was the one to write on

the boxes. "Keelan's Baby Stuff", no. "Ireland", no. Their had to be something

that clearly said "High School" or "Clare" or "Eli" but no.

"Are you kidding?" I say to myself. I hear a quiet outburst of laughter

emerge from my father's lips. "Dad?" I stand up and find him leaning against

the doorframe.

"What are you doing up here, kiddo?" he asks me

"In-home, self-taught education." I say turning back into the closet.

"Keelan Marie Goldsworthy, you definitely are my kid. Now come here," he

motions me into his arms and kisses the top of my head. "If you wanted to find

something good, you this is where you should've gone." he releases me and walks

towards his dresser. He pulls open the top drawer, rummaging trying to find

something.

"Yeah, if I wanted to find something good, I would so go through your

underwear drawer." I tell him.

He turns around with a box and sits down on the bed. He lifts the lid.

"Please, your mother doesn't even go through that drawer. I have so many pictures

of her when she was your age." I sit beside him as he begins to sift

through its content.

"I don't go through what?" My mom interrupts.

"Clare, sweetie. Hi." Dad fumbles and sends a picture flying to Mom's feet.

She picks it up. "I remember this. Adam took this for us." She flips the

picture around to reveal the two of them at what appears to be a high school

dance. Mom dressed in a cute black and white polka dot dress and Dad in a black

button up top with a red coat, both smiling, Uncle Adam managed to capture a perfect Kodak moment. "This was the first time I actually saw your father wear some

color other than black" she said handing the photo to me as she crept on the bed

behind us. She skimmed through the box as if she knew what she was doing.

"To be honest, hon, I have gone through that drawer before. A long time

ago. How else would I have found this?" she holds up a picture of my father

receiving his high school diploma, shaking hands with the principal. "Now this

was the second time I've seen him wear anything but black," she says, talking

about his blue graduation gown. "Oh, and this. You never did change that Clara

Edwin character." she holds up an old English assignment of his.

"Floozy, ingénue. It's all the same." he says. She smacks his shoulder. At

that moment, my dad playfully lunges at my mother, tickling her sides, kissing

her cheeks and then gently kisses her lips. "Not in front of our daughter" Mom

warns through a small giggle.

I turn my attention to the box, looking through what's inside. I pick up a

piece of jewelry, a ring, and fiddle with it on my finger. "I'm 16, nothing I

haven't seen before."

She snaps back up after hearing my response and sees the band glimmer in the

light, taking it out of my hand. "Do I have to make you wear this?" she

threatens

"A ring?" I ask

"I can always pull the hearse around front for when she has boys over."

Dad contributes

"It was my abstinence ring. I had no idea your father kept it after all

these years."

Dad quickly steals something from the box and walks around me. "I think

she much rather this than an abstinence ring." he places a chain around my neck,

clips it in the back and rotates it so I can see the metal guitar pick that

hangs off of it. My gaze adverts from the pick, to my father, to the photo I

have in my hand. It's the same necklace as the one he's wearing in the picture.

"Eli, honey, you kept your suspenders?" Mom asks, pulling a skinny black

pair from the box. The clips jingle as she waves them in the air.

I act fast. "I can make use of these." I take them from her and begin to

attach them to my gray skinny jeans. She laughs. "You definitely are your

father's child."

"She may have my fashion sense, but she has your personality." Dad

playfully argues back. Mom jokingly rolls her eyes. "At least both our smarts

wore off on her"

"Come on. Enough making fun of my high school years. Let's go eat." he

disappears down the hall.

Mom and I stand up from the bed and she captures me in a half hug. "If you

really wanted to find something interesting, you should've check behind his

dresser." She kisses my forehead and makes a quick escape after my father. My

eyes grow wide in curiosity but I resist checking and follow after them. My

family is definitely something.


End file.
